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Police check leads in murder
YOUNGSTOWN
Police have some leads to follow after a man was shot dead on the South Side on Sunday afternoon. That death was one of four violent crimes — including two homicides — in the city over the weekend.
William P. Jones, 55, was gunned down in front of a relative’s home on East Princeton Avenue about 3 p.m. Sunday.
Jones was homeless, the relative told The Vindicator. He was there to get a sandwich.
“Somebody went up the street in a black car,” said the relative, who did not want to give his name. “Five minutes after that, we heard two gunshots, and he was laying right there.”
He pointed to the yard in front of his house. He said he doesn’t know of anyone who would want to hurt Jones.
The dead-end street behind the McDonald’s restaurant on Market Street is usually very quiet, he said.
Youngstown Police Detective Sgt. Ron Rodway said other neighbors said the same — that they heard shots, then saw the victim in the yard.
He said police don’t yet have suspects, “but might have a reason.”
“We have a few leads to follow,” he said.
That killing climaxed a particularly violent weekend in the city that left two men dead and another man critically injured.
Xavier T. Vega, 28, was shot to death Friday on the East Side in the 300 block of South Jackson Street. Only hours later, Amos Dothard Jr., 18, of Plazaview Court in Youngstown was shot in a drive-by in the 800 block of East Philadelphia Avenue on the South Side — not far from Sunday’s killing.
Dothard was taken to St. Elizabeth Youngstown Hospital in critical condition.
In addition, a man was robbed at gunpoint late Saturday night at an ATM at Chase Bank on Market Street only several blocks from Sunday’s homicide. The robber made the victim strip, police reported.
Police said the robbery occurred at 2900 Market at 11:30 p.m.
The victim told police he withdrew $200 from the ATM and a man wearing dark clothes approached him and brandished a gun. He pointed it at his head.
He stole the money and the victim’s cell phone, then made him strip off his clothes and lie on the ground.
The weekend homicides bring the city’s 2015 toll to four. At this time last year, the city had recorded two homicides.